Page "John J. Beckley" Paragraph 1

Born in London at age twelve his impoverished parents sent him to Virginia to work as a scribe for a mercantile firm.

As an indentured servant he was of low social status, but as a literate and ambitious young man he used politics to move upward in society.

He graduated from the College of William and Mary and was one of the early members of Phi Beta Kappa.

By 1783 he had amassed of rich, unoccupied land in the west, but it was tied up in litigation.

Twice he served as mayor of Richmond, Virginia, from 1783 to 1784 and again from 1788 to 1789.